Community Plates "rescues" food to serve to needy

Amanda Cuda

Published 11:10 pm, Thursday, November 22, 2012

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community Plates, Brian Kelly, volunteer with the organization, and Willy Vargas, employee of Fairway, load donated food items from the grocery into Kelly's car on Wednesday, November 21, 2012. Kelly picks up donations at various locations and delivers them to organizations like homeless shelters to help feed the hungry.
Photo: Lindsay Niegelberg

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community...

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community Plates, Brian Kelly, volunteer with the organization, and Willy Vargas, employee of Fairway, load donated food items from the grocery into Kelly's car on Wednesday, November 21, 2012. Kelly picks up donations at various locations and delivers them to organizations like homeless shelters to help feed the hungry.
Photo: Lindsay Niegelberg

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community...

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community Plates, Brian Kelly, volunteer with the organization, and Willy Vargas, employee of Fairway, load donated food items from the grocery into Kelly's car on Wednesday, November 21, 2012. Kelly picks up donations at various locations and delivers them to organizations like homeless shelters to help feed the hungry.
Photo: Lindsay Niegelberg

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community...

From left, Alison Sherman, Director of Communications for Community Plates, and Brian Kelly, volunteer with the organization, load donated food items from Fairway into Kelly's car on Wednesday, November 21, 2012. Kelly picks up donations at various locations and delivers them to organizations like homeless shelters to help feed the hungry.
Photo: Lindsay Niegelberg

If the Thanksgiving holiday has left you with a pile of uneaten leftovers, you're not alone. Grocery stores, caterers, restaurants and other food service establishments that stocked up on turkey day items also find themselves with a significant amount of unused vittles.

Much of this bounty will get tossed. And that's a shame, considering how many Americans go hungry, said Kevin Mullins, executive director of Community Plates, a Connecticut-based organization that "rescues" food that's unused by grocery stores and the like and passes it on to food banks, food kitchens and other organizations that serve the needy. "Americans throw away about 25 to 40 percent of our food supply," Mullins said.

Yet about 50 million Americans live in food-insecure households, according to the United States Agriculture Department. Clearly, Mullins said, if there is food that's unsellable, but still safe and edible, there are plenty of people who can use it.

One goal of Community Plates, which started more than a year ago, is to make it easy for businesses to donate their excess food. Donors can select the day and time that's most convenient for Community Plates's volunteers (also known as "runners") to come pick up items. The runners then directly deliver them to hunger-relief agencies. Since it began, the agency has rescued nearly a million meals.

Currently, Community Plates only serves Fairfield County, Albuquerque, N.M., and Columbus, Ohio, but Mullins said the organization will add more branches next year, including one serving New Haven County.

The community service agency Person-to-Person, which has offices in Darien and Norwalk, has been receiving donations through Community Plates almost since it began. Person-to-Person Executive Director Ceci Maher said the agency has received thousands of dollars worth of food through the program. "We're getting food that stores may have thrown away and giving it to people who have an immediate need for it," she said.

Donor agencies, including Fairway Market in Stamford, are equally supportive of the program. The store's floor manager Sebastian Hernandez said Community Plates volunteers show up at the store almost daily and pick up hundreds of pounds of bread, produce and other items. Hernandez said he's always been aware of how much inventory gets unused at stores and has always been interested in finding something useful to do with the excess.

"I worked for a company previously where I would watch people throw unused food in a trash compactor and it just floored me," Hernandez said. "There's a real need for this food."

Though waste occurs throughout the year, Mullins expected to be particularly busy the day after Thanksgiving. Many stores stock up on specialty items for the holiday, he said, and those could get tossed when turkey day is over. Likewise, many restaurants and catering businesses have holiday menus, and not all that food makes it onto people's plates. Mullins said the organization has strict rules about what can be rescued, particularly when it comes to restaurant food. "We're not able to rescue anything that's been served to people," he said. "In the process of making sure they have enough food, restaurants always have plenty of leftovers."

To volunteer for, donate to, or receive food from Community Plates, visit www.communityplates.org or call 800-280-3298.